


After

by lesbianettes



Series: Merrick Industries [3]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Bathing/Washing, Crying, Hurt/Comfort, Italiano | Italian, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani Whump, Ligurian | Genoese | Zeneize, M/M, Missing Scene, Nicky | Nicolò di Genova Whump, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Trauma, Whump, showering together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:01:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26070814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianettes/pseuds/lesbianettes
Summary: What happened after they escaped.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: Merrick Industries [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1868779
Comments: 8
Kudos: 256





	After

When Nile comes to the rescue, Joe and Nicky do not bother to clean themselves of blood right away. Rather, they get right to the hard work of ensuring Merrick and his henchmen will never come after them again, and keeping one another safe in the face of all they’ve been through. There is the betrayal of Booker to content with, alongside Andy’s mortality, and Nicky finds that Nile is just as vicious in a fight as another woman had been so many centuries ago. She’s quick and intelligent, and she does not once question the way Nicky gets distracted finding Joe’s hand in his. Any moment they have, when they can spare the second of focus, he reaches for him. He needs to feel him, know he’s alive. He checks his pulse each time.

They’re messy, all five of them, by the time they walk out. Keane killed Nicky, and Joe killed him in turn. They kept Andy safe as they ended the lives of countless mercenaries, ending with Nile throwing herself and Merrick out the penthouse window, leaving nothing but death and destruction in their wake. Kozak remains alive. Although Nicky does not think he could face her again to kill her, he wishes she was dead, for all that she inflicted upon the both of them in her pursuit of what she thought was right. Should he say it aloud, one of the others would insist on doing it. He just wants to leave.

“Nicky,” Booker begins.

“Silenzio.”

He doesn’t want to speak in a tongue taught to him during conquests over the centuries, one Booker sinks into without an accent and everyone in that God-forsaken building loved. For Nile, he will indulge. She is young. But Booker does not deserve it, he can work around Italian though his French training had struggled with it for nearly 100 years after they all met. Nicky isn’t sure if he’s more angered, hurt, or disappointed by him, but he does know that what he wants more than anything is to curl up in bed with Joe and never move again.

Nile squeezes into the backseat with the two of them, leg pressed against Nicky’s on his left side, and rests her face against the window, allowing him a few of all the blood in her hair and covering her clothes. She jumped out of that building. It’s something she never should have had to do. None of them should have had to do anything the day demanded, or experience any of the pain forced upon them. He can’t erase the image of Joe’s body from his mind, twitching on the floor, or bleeding on that cold metal table.

Something in his face must give it away because Joe pulls him closer and presses his lips to Nicky’s forehead. They’re both a mess, but in a way that makes it alright for Nicky to hide his face in the crook of Joe’s shoulder. He rests one palm against his chest, feeling his heart as another level of reassurance. Together, they are quiet. No one can speak to what happened to them. 

The safehouse they go to is peaceful and has running water, hot, in two separate bathrooms. Booker sits in the main room in front of the door and keeps watch, not looking at anyone. Andy and Nile take turns in one, while the other is for Joe and Nicky, the two of them going without words. Now that they’re here, together, they don’t need to speak. Everything passes in touches and in lingering gazes, calm when they have the ability to reach one another like this. Slowly, they peel off their clothes- no cutting, pulling, ripping. It must be gentle. And it is, stripping down and trying to forget what’s happened to them. Nicky trails his hand across the smooth skin of Joe’s chest. There’s no more scars, not even scabs, to indicate the way he was cut open in that lab, dead for far longer than he should have ever been.

“Va bene,” Joe assures.

He wets a washcloth from under the sink in the hot spray of the shower, but the moment the fabric touches his face, he flinches away so hard he nearly falls. It’s only Joe’s quick reflexes that hold him up. 

“Keane mi fatto questo. Ha pulito la mia faccia, anche la tua. Non posso, Cuore.”

Joe sets the cloth aside and cups Nicky’s face, slow and loose, to see if this is alright- it is. With careful hands, he washes away the dried blood, aware of every little movement. And then he washes his hair, going until the water runs clear. Nicky returns the favor, even as hard as it is to be certain there is no mess left in Joe’s soft curls. He takes more time than he needs to. One thing that has always been a comfort to them both is when they lay in bed, Nicky playing with his hair, Joe often reading aloud or sketching. It’s a small comfort that he can have here, to try and calm himself from the way his heart is racing. 

Between the two of them, they slowly clean one another of the blood leftover from what happened to them. No washcloths, tender hands, and sweet-smelling soap that must have been Andy’s the last time they stayed here. It should help make it better, but there are too many awful things that happened, awful things it all reminded him of. He would like to crawl out of his body, if only to ease the pain for a moment.

“Nicolo, sei con mi?”

He nods. “Sì, sensa... mi non çercu stȃ.”

Joe’s face goes sad and soft, and he reaches out for him slowly, giving Nicky time to back away if he wants to. He doesn’t. Nicky lets Joe pull him close, resting in his embrace while the tears begin to come. They burn. Everything hurts, even now that they’re healed, and he doesn’t know the first thing about fixing it. 

“Lê u andiâ bon. You have to know that, amore mio.”

“My head knows it. My heart does not.”

They step out of the shower and towel off, barely stopping their bodies from dripping before they go to the bedroom that has always been theirs. This place is big enough for two rooms, and Andy and Booker have shared forever. There are clothes here for them. Nicky sets them out- soft pajama pants, big sweatshirts- while Joe puts fresh linens on the bed for them. He offers to get their food too, but the idea of Joe being out of his sight is endlessly terrifying. He needs to see him to know he’s safe. He doesn’t think before reaching for his wrist, but the brush of his fingertips makes Joe jump back from him. Afraid. Just like Nicky was in the shower. 

“Yusuf,” he says softly. 

Joe shakes his head and steps closer again. “It’s not you, my heart. It’s them.”

“Non possono ferirti qui.”

“It already happened.”

Then he sits on the edge of the bed, and Nicky sees how exhausted he truly is. This took a lot out of him, even when he was unconscious or dead for most of it, and Nicky regrets the amount he’s focused on himself, when he should have recognized their same pain. His usual observance, understanding, has been stolen from him as surely as his sense of comfort. This time, it is Nicky who opens his arms for an embrace, and Joe who falls into them and clings tighter than any lab restraints could have.

Nicky winds up joining him on the bed, setting his knees on either side of Joe’s thighs, and settling into his lap so they can hold each other. As wrapped up in each other as they are, he can feel Joe’s breath against his skin, fast and hitching as he begins to cry. They both can cry now. It’s safe to break. At some point, Andy comes in, leaving water and takeout containers on the nightstand, but she doesn’t disturb this reconstruction of their hearts. 

They lay down after a while, and don’t touch the food brought to them. Only each other. Although their lips don’t meet, they take turns exchanging kisses on any bared skin. Necks, cheeks, noses, hands. It’s easier to reconnect this way than to think of the way they were dragged apart in the van on the way to their torture. Neither of them speak. Whatever they could say won’t be enough in the face of the torture they endured. 

Joe’s thumb brushes his bottom lip and he turns away. Keane. If he dwells on the memory of being washed, being cleaned, being treated like a doll or a sword to be cared for and used. And when he thinks of Keane, he thinks of all of it- a hand on Joe’s throat, gun in his face, before he’s dragged away and stabbed. He thinks of his shirt being lifted off him and the threat of separation. And he tastes the gunpowder and cold metal in his mouth.

“Nicky. Nicolo.”

“Sono qui,” he answers.

“No, cuore mio, you’re still there.” Joe doesn’t touch his face again, instead resting his hand on Nicky’s hip like he often does when they’re half asleep. “We got out. We’re safe.”

It’s hard to believe that they’re truly safe, after everything they went through, but with Joe in his arms is as safe as they can be. This place is theirs, and the others are out in the room. Even with Booker, who betrayed them, staying on the couch, Andy and Nile will keep them safe now. At least long enough to remember how to breathe.

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr @transnicolo
> 
> [Translations](https://transnicolo.tumblr.com/post/627274361181732864/translations-for-after)


End file.
